Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1887-11-21

into the strife; neither should you turn
aside from the contests because you are be-
wildered and doubtful. You should learn
to judge between good and evil, and then
be ready TO strike manfully for the right
And, in order to do this, it is Indispensable
that you should put yourselves under a
wholesome and thorough discipline in
youth.
Unless you do this, you cannot find out
what is your proper place in society Now.
whatever may be your vocation, by careful
discipline you may qualify yourself TO be-
come center of extensive influence. 1t is
getting to be of comparatively little i'm
portance IN what particular department of
business young man commences life; if
he will only
CULTIVATE HIS FACULTIES
He may rise to the head of his profession,
and II that profession is unworthy of his
powers he will at last escape from it alto
gether. The secret of success is found in
improving to the best advantage such op-
portunities as lie around us. 1t is not BY
changing their position that men acquire
influence the good workman on the bench,
who determines first that the article which
he manufactures shall be as perfect as he
can make it, and then when his hammer
ing or stitching for the day is over, goes to
work with another set of tools to quicken
and inform his mind, is more respectable,
and, in the end, will become more infiu-
entail than the soperific proser in the pull
pit, or the laundering advocate at the bar
The time has been when this general men
tai culture would have been both impos-
sible and useless. Posts of honor and au-
thority were reserved for such as were born
to them, gratia Del; but, by the grace of
God, it is SO no longer. Look into your
city Councils, your scientific Conventions
read over the list of your popular poets,
and journalists and authors; consider who
they are, and what they are, that now give
TONE TO PUBLIC OPINION
And control society. Are they generally
such as were born to wealth, born to sta
ton, and bred in universities? There are
some who have inherited distinction; but
the great majority are such as have made
the most of limited advantages have strug-
gled against objections and forced their
way upward by their own interior strength.
But 1t is not so much with a view to posi-
ton and outward success that the Young
man should cultivate his mental powers.
There are better things than position and
outward success. He is bound to find out
what there is IN him, of what he is capa-
BILE; bound to develop himself, not so much
Tor the securing of honors and titles, and
being elected to Office, as from simple re-
gard as to what is due to his own nature.
And when [ speak of mans finding out
his own proper place, what he was made
for, and to what he may reasonably as
pire, that is what mean rather than out
ward
RANK OR OFFICIAL STATION.
The real influence which men exert does
not depend so much as it once did upon
external position. He who utters his own
thoughts is the one who now awakens the
echoes. The opinions of most men are, at
best, only echoes. What we need in this
generation is that each voice should have
Its own Specification. One of the great
evils OF American society is a tyrannical
public opinion-manufacture sometimes
out OF strange material the work of am
bilious demagogues and one-idead reform
ers. and angular bigots, and subscriber
seeking Journalists-which cannot be
| resisted without the risk of social martyr-
dom. Now, We want men who feel that
they are strong enough and intelligent
enough to sit i'll Judgment upon public
opinion and if an Idol be erected in the
land, even though it be seventy cubits high
and gllded from top to toe and labeled with
| the most sacred name, have the courage to
declare it an idol, and
THE MANLINEss TO STAND ERECT
When the sackbut and the dulcimer and
the psaltery call upon the multitude to
bow down and worship. We want men
who will tell the crowned Nebuchadnezzar
that he is only fit to eat grass with the
oxen; We want men who can walk
quietly into the lions den of popular
wrath rather than be disloyal to the God
OF truth. We want young men who can
even face the fiery furnace OF popular in
dlgnatlon, though seven times heated, con-
ndent that they are right, rather than yield
afford to be poor rather than violate their
c. nscience; to be accounted liars rather
than untrue to their convictions; to be
defrauded for the time rather than lose
their hold upon the generations that are to
follow; and such men must commences
Alright they must learn to bear the yoke
and their youth must undergo thorough
and earnest discipline, and having started in
| the right, continue on steadfasf, immoy-
able. firm, and true to the end.